I have in Atomage Nos. 11 and 15 extolled the pleasures to be gained from what I like to describe as ‘audio sensation’. I appreciate your printing my letters although they do not seem to have inspired any response with the exception of a reader whose interests l will come to in a moment – if you are kind enough to let me have some more of your space.

As previously described my ‘game’ is to record on my tape recorder all the lovely sounds of the materials – in my case rubber, although it works just as well with leather and vinyl. I like to hear the sounds of my suit, my mackintosh, my gloves, my hood and my boots, in rubber rhythm, as l move about. I record everything from the word ‘go’ – getting the clothes out of the wardrobe, donning each garment, doing up the zips, fastening buttons and forcing belts into place. I later like to play it back through my stereo headphones, dressed in all my rubber, lying on the bed until I explode!

I am currently experimenting with small microphones set down inside my boots and inside the suit and helmet, which brings me to the ‘game’ of my friend who I will call Mr. X. He is more one of your bondage fanatics and was kind enough to loan me one of his tapes where he was completely encased in a rubber suit with a throat microphone recording his feelings throughout this ‘ordeal’. At one stage he is beaten by someone and it is interesting to hear the ‘thwack’ of the whip on the rubber and his ‘reactions’. Various other ‘indignities’ are practiced on him and you can hear that his ‘reaction’ is very much a pleasurable one. The tape is badly marred by a lot of extraneous noise but I think with further experiments with a different type of microphone he would really have something well worth listening to again and again. Mr. X also loaned me a commercial tape purporting to be a ‘mistress’ responding to a ‘masters’ commands. The recording quality was dreadful, the voices almost inaudible and the sound effects theatrical. What a pity a good idea should suffer from commercial exploitation of the worst kind.

To those who might be interested in the technical side of my ‘game’ I would mention that I use a reel-to-reel recorder and stereo microphones mounted on a stand. I afterwards add additional rubber effects – creaking, rustling and wrinkling and so on – using a mixer. I also filter out extraneous noises to keep the quality of the sounds crisp! But I would add that almost any kind of tape recorder can be used and I believe it would be great fun to play the tapes if you have any kind of party with rubber (or leather) friends.

– K.T.G. (London)